Well... It was inevitable...

GALVESTON --Tar balls found Sunday on eastern Galveston Island were confirmed today as coming from the Gulf oil spill, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.

About a dozen tar balls that washed ashore on Crystal Beach were already identified Monday as oil from the BP well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, the first evidence that oil from the spill has reached the Texas coastline.

I know this topic gets discussed to great ends...and sometimes we all need a breather...but chalk up more destruction of Gulf waters, beaches, and marshes. (There are protected marshlands: Just a little behind the Pennisula that Crystal Beach sits on...By Port Arthur...and to the West of Galveston.)

Won't you continue to post here...as yet another outlet on the internet...against this horrific man-made disaster?

Every State the borders the Gulf now has oil washing up on it's shorelines.

And while most people mistakenly believe that oil just rises to the top for easy skimming... this is not the case with the unrefined Crude Oil. It's top to bottom, plus all the unknown chemicals that were dumped into the ocean to disperse it.

This disaster is going to require decades of healing... and probably won't completely heal in our lifetimes.

But who cares right... as long as BP makes money.

BP made almost $6 Billion in the first Quarter of this year. And so far has paid out $3 Billion. That's 6 weeks profit for a problem that is now 2 months old.

I won't be shedding any tears for the BP ahareholders. BP has plenty of cash. And Odumbo has done nothing to help the situation. He just sits back while BP tries to salvage their profit.

"Odumbo" ...Although I've never been a fan of blaming all our problems on one single person...no matter who he is or what his/her title is. However...in this situation I got'ta tell ya'...I never seen someone do so little during such a huge crisis before this one....EVER. But...the blame for the accident itself falls squarely on them that done it...IMO.

Whether the government should have regulated it stronger...will never come out fully anyways...even decades from now.

I, along with many others, am deeply and profoundly saddened by this terrible tragedy. It is maddening beyond description. For someone who considers themselves an environmentalist, there is no "I told you so" gratification, either. This is just too big, too incalculable as far as ongoing damage goes.We've been poking, prodding, and assaulting the planet for decades and are beginning to reap what's been sown by a select few companies who profit off of the harvesting of the earth's resources. This is inexcusable, unacceptable, and horrendous. I feel fortunate to live far from the gulf area and feel terrible for people who live and work there. It is all connected. We are all connected.My only hope is that this will be a catalyst for real change. I hope that we don't get caught up in politics and blame-games and that we are able to look at a much larger picture. This deep-sea drilling should never have been allowed. And it's time to do a helluva lot more than just talk about alternative energy.I'm not an Obama basher myself, but I do feel a disheartened when I see that all of the talk about being a friend to the environment may take a backseat to business as usual (ie selling out to corporations). The Native American proverb/prophecy just keeps playing in my head:"Only after the last tree has been cut down, only after the last river has been poisoned, only after the last fish has been caught, only then will you find that money cannot be eaten."

Wow..that is a powerful Native American proverb...really rings home...and true. I find it incomprehensible that others have to pay for what others have done...in order for certain others (who think they are sooo special!) to make a buck!

Maybe...if they just procastinate for another couple years...the oil leak in the Gulf will just eventually run dry. Anyone for a little raw crude oil in everything you drink or eat? And speaking of eating...it sure won't be any seafood that folks will be eating in the future...at this present rate.

I can't blame BP for this mess or Odumbo--although I think he's a useless piece of garbage. WE are at fault. BP was just the conduit.

Every single one of us that still owns a gas guzzler, or who turns up their thermostat in the winter, doesn't carpool to work or drives their car to the store instead of getting up off of their arse and walking or biking is at fault. If there wasn't a demand for BP's products, BP wouldn't be in business making gazillions of dollars per year. Full stop.

How about people who need large vehicles for their jobs? How about people who live where it gets very cold in winter? How about those who don't live near others who work at the same place? How about those who would be looking at a two hour walk or a bike ride across an interstate to get to the store? Are they environmental criminals?

The dispersant that was used is what has me worried. The gulf has survived other spills. It will survive this one. However we may never know the effects this chemical dispersant has had on the enviroment. It will all be blamed on the spill.

the dispersants are extremely toxic. there is a lot of marine animal death in the water. the dispersants break up into tiny particles that look like plankton. the fish swim through the water column with their mouths open and swallow this toxic material.

Those of us who live on or near the gulf coast are very concerned about the dispersants. Although we have been assured the actual oil cannot be evaporated into the atmosphere and find its way into the rain we very much need on our fields; the same cannot be said about the dispersants. So the question remains, can these harmful chemicals adhere to the water molecules and be evaporated with the water thus poisoning the rain water?

Not to mention our continued hurricane watch during this time of year, we now worry what will happen with all this oil if we have a particularly active hurricane season or even one Cat 3 or higher hurricane.

That makes sense...as I watched a special on the Oil Spill on the Discovery channel...over a month ago...and they said the spill had already gotten out of the Loop of the Gulf Currents. Then all it has to do is ride the Gulf stream if it gets around the edge of Florida...It could end up sending remnants or more right back to BP's home territory.

Hi manly poetguy - In the uK we already have almost every beach awash with tar balls from every part of the world, from various oil spills and disasters everywhere including in our own waters. Nobody here will get upset by them, we are resigned to the type of situation you find yourself in with the gulf spill, for you it is new but yo will soon get used to the severe reduction in marine life, underwater deserts where once there were marine forests and grass plains with ish and all. The issue is not local is is global and while I sympathise and, with you wish it wasn't happening, it is a global issue and requres a global response.

just the fact that the dispersants are banned from use in the UK wasn't enough to stop them from being used here. I guess it was a trade off, kill the marine life in the Gulf and affect the food chain or protect the marshes. it doesn't seem to be going well on either end. I don't trust a word BP says about the dispersants. we already know it is highly toxic. I don't like this whole science experiment approach.

although not as often as at first, there are still days when I can faintly detect the odor in the air if the breeze is coming from the northwest.

Related Discussions

Is anyone else seriously worried about the BP oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico?I've been staying on top of all the news reports and findings as well as researching the effects of previous oil spills and it seem the more I learn the more unsettling this whole situation becomes.

The Gulf oil spill is bad. For that matter any oil spill is bad. I am not a rabid environmentalist but I do believe we need to protect the wildlife we have left as well as our beaches and wetlands. To a point. Let's not get carried away. Chris Matthews actually called...

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